These falls are easily accessible for folks who aren't up to a big hike. Click on the pic for the original post.

Woolly redux: wet, but not so wild

A couple of years ago about this time, the bottom dropped out all over Arkansas and particularly in Central Arkansas including the area around Woolly Hollow State Park. While the griping was rampant during the storms, the aftermath was rewarding.

The crown jewel of the park is Lake Bennett, a man-made lake held in place by a massive earthen dam built by our grandfathers and uncles in the CCC in the 30s. The spillway feeds the falls below nicely.

The top of the dam is fortified with large sharp riprap rocks with the pointy ends up. Think 300-foot tyrannosaurus rex mandible. Probably discourages horse-play on the top of the dam.

Click on the pic for the original Corndancer story

Though the lake is small compared to other man-man lakes, its scenic index is among the best. The outflow from the dam spillway cascades and snakes through a rugged descent making for easily accessible falls looking.

You can walk over the falls at Mammoth Spring, Arkansas. Few waterfalls can make this claim. Furthermore you are welcome and encouraged to make the stroll. A long-of-tooth dam (1887) makes the falls,

Dams make these fine falls, thus “Two dam falls.” You can still show this article to your Momma without fear of retribution.

Falls at Rockbridge, Missouri created by a mill pond dam completed c. 1868.

See more falls at Cordancer dot-com,

Before we venture further with the falls, I suggest you take a look at the Photo of the Week page at Corndancer dot-com where this story had its beginning, You will see different views of the falls and a neat country road. Take a look. We’ll wait here for your return.

Waterfalls do not necessarily have to be naturally occurring to be cool, make nice sounds, and elicit “OOO” and “AHH” from enthralled onlookers. I was in the presence a couple of man-made falls weekend last which neatly support that theory. The other upside to man-made falls is that man had to get in there to make what ever it is that makes the falls, so it is generally a lot easier, with substantially lower exposure to chiggers, ticks, snakes, and grievous slips and falls, to sally forth and see the falls.

How to shoot a barn in the rain: Step inside an adjacent barn, out of the rain and fire away. Both structures are on the Mackey Place, part of the Rockbridge Trout Ranch at Rockbridge, Missouri.

Around a quarter mile or so from, the Rockbridge falls, you will find the Mackey Place barns along with residential facilities for guests of the Rockbridge Trout Ranch. Not every place you stay offers you a fine old red barn in your yard.

Bluffs near Rockbridge Missouri. Not long after I shot this image, a couple of anglers were casting flies which a few unsuspecting trout grabbed up. Tasty catches.

The waterfalls, the barns, and the bluff scene, (the dam controls the flow upstream), are prima-facie evidence that man can successfully interact with mother nature and live in harmony. Keep in mind that each of these aforementioned relationships began more than 100 years ago. If we could do it then, surely we can do it now.

See an old store and station with a 35 cent per gallon gas pump, high-resolution pictures of the falls, an old house, a low water bridge, an old house and high resolution pictures of the falls on our Weekly Grist gallery.

Non-fattening, rated G and high in natural content. You will not be tested on the content you observe. Click here if you missed the other links.

I would guess Woolly Hollow Falls drop around 40 or 50 feet from top to bottom, but not in a straight line. The stair-stepped falls make for good eye candy.

Few things command ones undivided attention better than a waterfall. You don’t have to turn it on and you can’t turn it down, or off. And, in all likelihood you are viewing its magnificence voluntarily. Since it has your undivided attention, you might as well take advantage of the therapeutic benefits accrued while standing in awe of one of Mother Nature’s most powerful creations. Even better, it will not attack or bite and unless you decide to personally sample its turbulence, surviving the experience is a virtual lock.

Waterfall therapy techniques are addressed along with some other pictures of the falls on the Photo of the Week page at Corndancer dot com. Get in on these revelations and photos by clicking here, a very cool thing to do.

We are visiting the falls below the dam which makes 40 acre Lake Bennett at Woolly Hollow State Park near Greenbrier, Arkansas. The falls are easily accessible from a trail near the entrance to the park. The park is very popular. There is an office and gift shop in the park which freely dispenses information about the premises.

The top of the dam forming Lake Bennett. While the vegetation may look a bit unkempt, it is nature’s way and a good thing, adding its tendrils to the overall strength of the dam, which was built by the CCC in 1935. This is one of the few places were you see rip-rap embedded in concrete, pointy-side up. One presumes to prevent using the dam as a playground.

While accessing the falls from the bottom is no trick due to the well constructed and tended trail, seeing if from the top at water level is another story all together. One descends from an impromptu parking place on the entrance road near the dam to the lake’s edge. From there follow the lake’s edge until you are even with the dam. At this water level, that required a small wade, not a big deal.

This bluff is just below and past the east end of the dam, and above the falls.

From there, it would be better if you had the sure footedness of a mountain goat because the top of the dam is laced with rip-rap. You gingerly walk across the top of the dam and wind up near the small bluff you see above. Traipsing across small rip-rap is not my strongest point, but the visual reward at the end of the walk was worth it. Not recommended for anyone with mobility limitations.

Further downstream from the dam, this is the last stretch before the falls begin to drop. I decided here to curtail my southerly trek along the creek and return to the truck. It looked a tad woolier than I wanted to deal with, if you will forgive the pun.

I followed the stream about another 75 yards or so. The trail was visible, but not well-worn. Not recommended if you take exception to wading and breaking your way through some underbrush. Since I have absolutely no objections to any of the above, I crashed on through like a bull in a china shop. When I got to the stretch of creek above, I shot and turned back, believing at my age that discretion indeed may be the better part of valor. The drop of the falls was not far ahead, but substantially more easily accessible from the bottom.

But wait, there is definitely more

See high resolution versions of all Corndancer and Weekly Grist pictures in our weekly high-resolution gallery. Click here to go there. This week we are including a black and white version of all pictures in this gallery.

A good hike along a wet, rocky, and overgrown trail is one you walk away from in one piece. Thank goodness for small favors and thank you for dropping by,